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Chapter 11: A New ProtocolThe lab had been fundamentally remapped. The coordinates of their professional relationship had been erased, redrawn by the desperate, life-affirming kiss in the dim blue light. The air, once thick with the ozone of competition, now carried the warmer, more complex scent of shared vulnerability.Aarav moved through the space differently. The rigid, alpha posture was still there, a lifetime of habit, but it was softened at the edges. He was quieter, more contemplative. His gaze, once a laser focused on holographic schematics, now often drifted to Mira, lingering with a kind of quiet wonder, as if